The classifieds business

Rolv Erik Ryssdal and Terje Seljeseth agree that it’s a huge advantage for Adevinta to be well-positioned in the circular […]

Rolv Erik Ryssdal and Terje Seljeseth agree that it’s a huge advantage for Adevinta to be well-positioned in the circular economy.

Schibsteds’ marketplaces operations outside the Nordics was spun off and established as the company Adevinta. What’s the strategy for the new company? What’s the future of buying and selling stuff? And is increased awareness on circular economy important to Adevinta?

In our latest podcast we take a closer look at Adevinta and the future of classified businesses. Together with Kjersti Løken Stavrum, CEO of the Tinius Trust, is Rolv Erik Ryssdal, CEO of Adevinta, and Terje Seljeseth, chief analyst at the Tinius Trust and board member of Adevinta.

Listen to the episode below or find Tinius Talks in your favorite podcast application, for instance iTunes, Spotify or SoundCloud.

In the podcast, Løken Stavrum ask the panel about the future of buying and selling products and whether circular economy is a key trend.

The focus on environment and reuse will only increase in the future. We are lucky to be in that business. And I must admit, we didn’t think about that at the beginning, says Terje Seljeseth, board member of Adevinta.

– But we always knew that second-hand trade is good for society. We are seeing that this is becoming increasingly important both for employees and attracting talent, but also for customers, says Rolv Erik Ryssdal, CEO of Adevinta.

– Even for investors, actually, Terje Seljeseth adds.

Løken Stavrum refers to the success of growing international classifieds within Schibsted and ask Ryssdal about the ambitions for the new company.

– Adevinta that will focus only on classifieds and continue to grow and take part in international consolidation, he says.

You will rather see us doing more in markets we are already present in or in adjacent markets. There are some big markets in Europe where we’re not present today, and if the right opportunity occurs, we will explore them, says Ryssdal.

The panel also think there is a big development in terms of what classifieds services will look like in the future.

– Leboncoin, the french classifieds company in Adevinta, has now launched a personalized service. We’ll take care of the payment, the shipping, delivery and everything. Continuous product development is an absolute necessity, says Ryssdal.

Our users’ expectations are not set by only what they did at Finn.no, but more broadly what they did on other digital media. How you interact with Spotify, Netflix, VG and so on. That’s raising the bar for user expectations and we have to be at the forefront, Ryssdal says.

Terje Seljeseth thinks the development of more personalized services is positive for users.

– It will be much easier to find what you are looking for. You will even find things before you start to look for them. We’ll focus on matching in Adevinta – on finding the right objects to the right buyer and vice versa, Seljeseth says.